Scientists Detect Strongest Signs Yet of Ancient Life on Mars: NASA-Backed Study
PakkaHyderabadi 
NASA and Imperial College London scientists have identified organic matter and minerals in Jezero Crater rocks—possible biosignatures of ancient life on Mars.
In what could be the most compelling evidence yet of ancient microbial life on Mars, an international team of scientists led by NASA and researchers from Imperial College London have discovered organic matter and minerals in Martian rocks that hint at past habitable conditions on the Red Planet.
The new findings come from the Bright Angel formation inside Mars’s Jezero Crater, an ancient lakebed that has long been a top target for scientists searching for traces of life.
According to the study, published in Nature, these geological features—rich in silica, clays, and organic carbon—could represent possible biosignatures, or chemical evidence of life.
“This is a very exciting discovery of a potential biosignature, but it does not mean we have discovered life on Mars,” said Professor Sanjeev Gupta, from Imperial’s Department of Earth Science and Engineering (ESE). “We now need to analyse this rock sample on Earth to truly confirm if biological processes were involved or not.”
🚀 NASA’s Perseverance Rover finds clues in ancient Martian valley
The discovery was made by NASA’s Perseverance Rover, which has been exploring the 45-kilometre-wide Jezero Crater since 2021 as part of the Mars 2020 mission.
The rover detected unusual fine-grained mudstones and conglomerates while driving through a river valley called Neretva Vallis. Detailed analyses using onboard instruments like PIXL (Planetary Instrument for X-ray Lithochemistry) and SHERLOC (Scanning Habitable Environments with Raman & Luminescence for Organics & Chemicals) revealed lake-like sediments within the valley—an unexpected discovery.
“This is unusual but very intriguing,” said Alex Jones, a PhD researcher at Imperial College and part of the NASA Perseverance team. “We wouldn’t expect to find such deposits in Neretva Vallis. What our analysis shows is a low-energy lake environment—and that is precisely the kind of habitable environment we have been looking for.”
🌍 A lake at the bottom of a river valley? A Martian mystery
ESE researchers reconstructed the ancient landscape using sediment mapping and concluded that lake deposits had formed at the bottom of a river valley—a geological puzzle that could point to temporary flooding events in Mars’s past.
The results suggest that parts of the Jezero Crater may have once been covered by standing water, creating favourable conditions for microbial life billions of years ago.
🔬 Next step: Bringing Mars rocks to Earth
NASA’s Mars Sample Return mission aims to bring back selected rock and soil samples—including those from the Bright Angel site—for detailed analysis. Only with Earth-based instruments, scientists say, can they confirm whether these organic compounds are truly of biological origin.
The discovery strengthens the case that Mars once hosted environments capable of sustaining life, echoing Earth’s early microbial ecosystems.
